Pockets of Posies
by FrankandJoe3
Summary: The Riddler has left a riddle for the team to decipher, one that hits a little too close to home for one of the team members.


**I was in History and we were discussing the mentioned song, when I suddenly found a connection between it and Robin, so I had to play on it. ****  
Disclaimer: I don't own the song or the characters.**

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A graveyard's original purpose was to house that of the dead and to keep the air free from the smell of rotting flesh by neatly disposing the corpses deep under the flush green grass, tall wrought iron gates parting only to that of the family wishing to leave flowers in memory beside the granite slabs. The gray stones were marked with the names of those safely sealed within the earth, often times statues and plants lining the area only to crack or die and give the family faint hope that maybe their loved one is hovering to give a final farewell.

On the setting rays of the afternoon sun though, following the silent ping of a tracking beacon on a holographic computer screen, six teens found themselves within the depth of a make-shift cemetery. Only five slabs were evenly pressed into the earth, but it wasn't where the gazes were all set to, rather the box directly in the center of the arrangement. It was no more than a foot on any side and a jade green, but it was the purple question mark pressed into the lid that made it so unique.

Though the location was questionable—why would a Riddler goon travel to a shoddy excuse for a graveyard?—that center piece only protested their doubts and had them cautiously exchanging glances. Even a hero had time to bother with hesitance, especially now in dealing with something they weren't sure the contents of.

Once touched, the box could detonate. Maybe once opened, a toxic gas would creep out and poison them all. Several deadly animals could be inside, bombs of all sorts as well; the fates went on forever in all directions it seemed. A foot of pure evil. How devastating.

There was only one soul among them who seemed to have a sense of what was going on, and even he refused to go anywhere near the box, but he had a good reason. The contents of the box weren't much to his concern—more the lock if anything. It wouldn't budge if the password was incorrect, and if it _was _wrong, one of the presumed fates could unfold upon them. That just added to the riddle.

"What do you make of it, Robbie?" Kid Flash asked, recognizing the look on Robin's face with a single glance, following the direction the panes of his domino mask seemed to be edged towards.

The ebony let his eyes sweep the gravestones again, arms folded over his chest with the holographic screen floating beside his shoulder flat, before he started circling them, hopping to his tip-toes to glance inside the circle to check for names.

"The Riddler isn't one of our worst baddies. He's more brains than all else, so all he has here is a clue to lead us to him. More than likely hinting to one of the six companies we're suspecting, mostly because he has a thin patience. Five gravestones, and there's a marking on each one. Combined should give us a clue to the answer," he explained to them, almost a little jealous that they had only had one previous run in with this guy before now.

The nod of heads was near perfect unison before the other five members of the team he supposed he was leading for now knelt before a gravestone, squinting at the markings before they made sense of it. Robin readied to jot down what they read.

"I have a Y," Aqualad decided, rising from his knees.

"I have an S and…. An awkward C," Miss Martian decided with a small smile.

"G and R, babe," Kid Flash smirked, sitting in the grass beside his tombstone and resting his elbows atop his knees.

"A," Superboy stiffly read, rubbing his neck with a supportive smile.

"I… This uh… Kind of looks like… either a curved I or a backwards C… and an N," Artemis laughed sheepishly, earning the speedster's gaze beside her with a casual shrug.

The protégé of one of the world's best detectives ran a hand back through his hair roughly for a second, eyes darting fast underneath the domino mask as he analyzed the letters, mixing them around with a determined look.

"Backwards C and awkward C make an odd O. So we've got a Y, S, O, G, R, A and an N…" he froze right as he said it, blinking and raising a trembling hand to confirm his suspicions. "Uh… KF… c'mere a sec?"

The ginger groaned at the order, sprawling out in the grass with a pout, obviously firm on his comfort for the moment.

"Can't you come over here?" he whined.

Robin exhaled strong through his nose, but he knew his friend had a point. He couldn't withhold suspicions from the team. America was in a serious danger and he could save it, this being a possible clue. He was beaten to the point though.

"We're looking for a gray son? That shouldn't be too hard. Crosses off the women from the list and narrows it down to an old guy," Artemis smirked with a sense of accomplishment, earning a high five from Megan that they thought was discrete.

Kid Flash's emerald eyes snapped open and he sat up quick, eyes darting to the arrangement at his friend's fingertips, now standing beside him with a hand to his shoulder for balance, squinting at the last name to make sure he was reading it right.

"Not _a _gray son, Arty," he corrected slowly, watching the acrobat's expression to make sure it was okay to continue on, "Grayson. Like the last name."

The ebony bobbed his head, but his expression showed it hadn't stopped it from hurting in the slightest, his teeth ground a bit closer together than usual.

"Ah… ward… adoption… adopt… Wayne… death… murder… Zucco… gang… circus… acrobat… flying… flew… flown… nuts… screw… screws… fall… fell…" he began to murmur under his breath frantically, pausing as a red glove tightened on his shoulder.

"Artemis could be right though," the sixteen year old breathed quietly, lip movements unnoticed as the blue holographic screen did a work of blurring it.

The bird seemed almost a bit too eager to shake his head, clinging to the thought like it was that strong hand separating him from the seventy foot drop to the dirt-clad ground below.

"Too much of a coincidence," he argued, tugging at his hair again idly while the words continued to slowly part his lips, "Who were the owners of the companies again?"

He was mainly keeping conversation with himself though, it seemed, as he pulled the list up and quickly scanned it.

Burt Ward  
Lizabeth Denise  
Danny Gherig  
Jacob Pollick  
Rose Smith  
Jared Thomsen

Six totally unrelated names holding no connections over a quiet rivalry that was no more deadly than hamsters inside balls covered in bubble wrap going at each other. It only pressed further on his frustration.

"Ward… Ward fits… too easy though, much too easy… ah… Rose is a general term, noun, makes it easy to wordplay… try and connect it, Boy Wonder," he chided himself with a disappointed scowl towards himself.

Kid Flash took a step back and offered a comforting glance to the rest of the team.

"Let our half of the Dynamic Duo do the dynamics. He knows what he's doing," he assured them, though his glance back at the fourteen year old wasn't one of full confidence.

That boy was his best friend; that was without a doubt or drop of hesitation spent to waste, but that was also the boy with the esteem issues of a teenage girl and the stability of a nuclear plant. He didn't need this. Well, he didn't _need _anything if one had to go technical, but with the anniversary of their death coming up this soon, he wasn't in need of a reminder. The mask was a great representation of the little bird, something the ginger knew better than anyone else in the world.

"Rose… flowers… plants… decorations… décor… compass… winds… how many… how old was… spotlight… acrobat… trapeze…" he groaned, sitting down in the grass and drumming his hands against his temples. "They… left… direction… smashed… broke… fell… fell down… we all… we all fall down…"

A look crossed his face and a small flicker of hope crossed his features.

"We all fall down! Agh! What's that nursery rhyme… ahh…" he looked up at the sky, hopping to his feet, squirming as he struggled.

The team awkwardly blinked at him before glancing among themselves.

"Ring around the Rosie?" Superboy offered without a drop of emotion to his face.

He didn't need any, lucky for him, for the little acrobat seemed to have it all as he shimmed in place, a brilliant grin lighting up his face as he found himself right.

"It's Rose! Rose Smith!" he dove past them, kneeling in the center of the gravestone circle and frantically typing her company's name in, giggling like a child with free choice of any toy in the aisle to celebrate their birthday in the toy store.

The question mark faded off and the box easily opened under his touch, a small beverage bottle trapped within the confines serving as his prize.

'Drink up, kids' was written along the wrapping with a smile, obviously in Sharpie.

That part rolled the navy eyes behind the domino mask, but he still felt a bit of accomplishment as he held it in his hands.

"KF, contact Batman. Tell him to escort the employees out," Robin asked the speedster, skimming his thumb over the bottle's exterior before he uncapped it and rested it back in the center of the gravestones.

A syringe emerged from his utility belt and he was quickly sucking the green liquid up into the container as the hovering silence, factoring out Kid Flash, held tight to the air. Only after the needle had inserted to a part of the Boy Wonder's glove and pulled up the blue analytic screen was it broken.

"Robin… how'd you get Go-Glow from Grayson?" Artemis asked slowly.

The team all knew that the ebony knew more than his age should have been familiar with, but this was a little too much to be coincidental and everyone was beyond suspicious now, their gazes carefully trained on him. His mind was on what his eyes were reading though, the connection between it and his mouth not quite working top speed.

"The Graysons were murdered when the cords to their trapeze bar were cut during the final show of Haley's Circus Coastal Tour. They all fell down—to the tent's floor in their case."

That didn't ease the comfort of any of the team.

"And… you knew this… _how_?" Superboy stepped in, suspicion laced strong in his furrowed brows.

The question helped it occur to the ebony that it hadn't just been a thought, tensing him straight to his core where his mind parted ways, desperately thinking up an excuse.

"When we went undercover on their International Tour, Ja- er, the ringleader said I reminded him a bit of the family's son. Something like that doesn't… doesn't leave you be," he fixed his eyes back to the screen, fingers racing along against the holographic keys.

The dissatisfaction was unvoiced and the question was left to die, but Robin felt it cloud the area and trap him in that ring, all centered around Rosy, and it didn't take pockets of posies to know that pretty soon, he'd be falling too. They all would, all the way down, only that wasn't part of a nursery rhyme.

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**I am done with endings. I'm divorcing it, and I'm taking the dog. I will drown that dog and leave it on Ending's front porch to let it know how done we are, alright?! But um. I guess this wasn't one of my best, I apologize for it, but the concept sounded good in my head. **

**-F.J. III**


End file.
